Why christianity still exists...

[Asuryan]

You are right, I am arrogant but only because I have confidence in what I believe, not because I think I am better than you. I am sorry if I offended you, I will try to tone it down.

 

Thank you.

 

I did apologize to Daniel.  I know that people can lose their faith when not able to provide an answer to why they believe, you are proof of that. 

 

That was not my case, and I doubt that it is the case of my fine fellows here as well.

I know perfectly well why I believed. Bear with me here, I'd like to hear your thoughts about it.

 

I believed, first of all, because of having been indoctrinated since birth from a catholic family in a heavily catholic society (as I've written to Amanda elsewhere, there is no liberté - egalité - fraternité here...). If you think that early indoctrination and the social context people live in have no influence whatsoever over a person's beliefs, you are naive: Stalin said "Give me a child, from his birth until he's 6 years old, and he will be mine forever".

My parents, and my lovely grandmother, told me that there is a god. The society around me did that exact same thing. I've been repeated a lot of times that jesus is friend of all the children, that jesus loves you so much that he died "to allow you to get to heaven" (the sunday school teacher was very careful to avoid saying "to wash our sins", because someone would, for sure, have asked why were we sinners, what had we done so wrong that poor jesus had to die because of us, and she DIDN'T want to open that particular can of worms). This, and lots of other base christian catholic tenets (salvations through works, priests shouldn't marry, the holy wafer is actually human flesh and blood and you ABSOLUTELY must NOT chew it or the priest will look at you in sheer horror!!), I made mine as much as I made mine other tenets: wash your hands before dinner, always say please and thank you, too much ice cream is bad for you, going to school is good for you, believing in god is good for you, not going to mass and sunday school is bad for you.

Your parents and the people around you while you grow up teach you the basic rules you'll abide during the rest of your life, unless something happens to make you change your mind (seriously change your mind, I'm not talking about teenage rebellion here).

 

If you're familiar with watsonian conditioning, you'll easily understand what I'm about to say: you see, when one is a child in Italy, she soon discovers that there is a very tight association between christianity and happy moments. All christian festivities here are associated with holidays (no school!), gifts, eating sweets and chocolate, staying together with a lot of relatives and children your age... mind you, just christian festivities. The civilian festivities, here, are not celebrated at all. I'm sure that you can see how it happens that a strong bond between Jesus and happiness develops very soon inside people's minds.

 

Add to this the fact that the children here are never exposed to other religions. Or to the existence of atheism, for what matters: try and imagine a country where everyone and everything is catholic, and there is really no other confession here. So they don't know anything about the existence of other beliefs, not until they are teenagers or go to high school.

 

Don't all of this constitute a good answer to the question: why did I believe?

This is why I believed. So, I didn't left the fold because of an inability to answer that question.

 

He seems well enough eqipped and I misjudged his ability to defend God's Word and his belief. 

 

How is systematically avoiding all of the questions posed to him until we're steaming from annoyance and frustration, being well equipped? How is he defending God's Word and his belief, when everything he's done is just quoting scriptures that have on our ears the same effect that our quoting the Quran would have on yours?

Don't you see how everytime he speaks, he only makes everyone around him angrier and angrier, because when we ask him "How much is 2+2" he answers "He died for your sins!" instead than "4"? Heck, even a "6" would be ok, at least we would get the impression that he's *listening* to what we say!

 

I am concerned about the lost, it is not only something I am compelled to do out of compassion, but it is also commanded of all Christians.

101396[/snapback]

 

So you are concerned about me?

Why?

[Vigile]

Yeah.  I thought about that before I made the offer.  But, there's no one here who would sell their integrity for a paltry $500......

 

Whoa.  Wait a minute. 

 

PURPLE RHINO!

 

Hey.  I may have to rethink this deal.

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And he's not even here to defend himself, you shameful heathen

[Vigile]

Not to mention could have a poser ex-christian build up a rep then sudenly "find jesus" again just to screw you out of money.

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So you are saying that there are actually xtians with no integrity???

[Vigile]

*huge eyeroll* Great, he's here to save us all, but first he's going to insult us all with the usual "we were never true christians"

101152[/snapback]

 

Yeah, that's what they are trained to do, break 'em down, then rebuild 'em. The poor sheep never know what hits them.

[Asuryan]

So you are saying that there are actually xtians with no integrity??? 

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Xtians are always a true display of integrity.

Even when they're torturing someone then burning her at the stake because she's a jew or she knows how to use herbs to cure ailments and illnesses. Yep, integrity, that's them.

[Vigile]

"Pork god" <-- "Porco Dio", a blasphemy, but I'll admit that once you translate it it lacks the sheer force it has got in italian 

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Yeah, Italians cringe when they hear it. I don't think there is an English equivalent that has the same impact.

[Vigile]

I know that people can lose their faith when not able to provide an answer to why they believe, you are proof of that.

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OMG! Could you be any more condescending?

 

And just to set the record straight, we got plenty of answers in our quests (some of which involved years and countless hours of study mind you), just not the ones we expected. But you just keep on living in your little self-delusional hole and keep telling yourself that you have superior knowledge.

 

It really does seem that in your world to be a xtian you must either be dumb and innocent like Daniel or you must be really really erudite for anything in between puts you in danger of buying the devil's lies. How quaint.

[Asuryan]

 

Yeah, Italians cringe when they hear it.  I don't think there is an English equivalent that has the same impact.

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First of all, good sir, I'll let you know that your feline rotating big ass is hypnotizing me.

 

Next, I'd like to know what is the absolutely worst blasphemy that exists in english. Now you've made me wonder.

[Vigile]

First of all, good sir, I'll let you know that your feline rotating big ass is hypnotizing me. 

 

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Heh, heh, heh... All part of my master plan to seduce the female species

 

Next, I'd like to know what is the absolutely worst blasphemy that exists in english. Now you've made me wonder. 

101512[/snapback]

 

That's a good question, which I don't know the answer to. Perhaps if others would contribute some ideas we could really give IPray something to cringe for. We could promise to let up as soon as she addresses even one of our challenges.

[Checkmate]

 

Yeah, Italians cringe when they hear it.  I don't think there is an English equivalent that has the same impact.

101507[/snapback]

 

First of all, good sir, I'll let you know that your feline rotating big ass is hypnotizing me.

 

Next, I'd like to know what is the absolutely worst blasphemy that exists in english. Now you've made me wonder.

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How about:

 

"FUCK GOD!", or "Jesus TITS!", or "Jesus Fucking Christ!", or "Jesus Fucking Christ on a crutch!"

 

These are the ones I use that typically raise the hackles of my listeners. Will any of these suffice as "most blasphemous"?

[BeccasStillSeeking]

Pure arrogance. She's the knight in shining armor, we are the ugly dragons. Feh.

 

Dragons can be quite beautiful. Have you ever seen any of Anne Macaffery's book covers? Or antique Chinese art?

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Hey, I'm a dragon! *gronk* Does that mean I get a bigass pile of gold to sit on?

[BeccasStillSeeking]

*huge eyeroll* Great, he's here to save us all, but first he's going to insult us all with the usual "we were never true christians"

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Yeah, that's what they are trained to do, break 'em down, then rebuild 'em. The poor sheep never know what hits them.

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What a vile, horrible thing to do. Need I point out that that nice longhaired Jewish reformer they all claim to follow would never pull crap like that?

[Mythra]

How about:

"FUCK GOD!",  or "Jesus TITS!", or "Jesus Fucking Christ!", or "Jesus Fucking Christ on a crutch!"

These are the ones I use that typically raise the hackles of my listeners.  Will any of these suffice as "most blasphemous"? 

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Nah. You gotta blaspheme the holy phantom.

 

But, I won't do it, cause I'm holding out for a deathbed conversion, and I want to remain pardonable.

 

 

Oh, and my mention of Purple Rhino was a bold move to try and bring him out of hiding. I miss the goofy bastard.

[Asuryan]

How about:

"FUCK GOD!",  or "Jesus TITS!", or "Jesus Fucking Christ!", or "Jesus Fucking Christ on a crutch!"

These are the ones I use that typically raise the hackles of my listeners.  Will any of these suffice as "most blasphemous"?  

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Why would jesus need a crutch? Unless with "on" you mean "up his righteous ass"

The first and third one seem nice and offensive enough the word "fuck" is powerful in itself. At least for an outsider. Even south park - the movie says that fuck is the worst word that one can say

 

 

Nah.  You gotta blaspheme the holy phantom.

 

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Not an easy task to do. The concept of an holy ghost is so vague, I mean, what should that be exactly? How should I visualize it? In sunday school, we were told that the holy ghost has the form of a dove. Does it have any sense, scripturally?

 

I remember a case of blasphemy creation, that happened inside my group of friends. We were playing Vampire Redemption at the time, and a wizard NPC there greets you saying "Dio t'assista" <--- meaning "May God assist you".

But the NPC didn't have a good voice actor, so it seemed more like.

"Dio tassista" <--- "God is a taxi driver!". We started calling god a taxi driver from that moment on, of course it was nice because no christian could sue us - we were only invoking the assistance of god, right? But there was something ...wrong with our tone of voice, and they could never understand why...